Igo Ltd

Thanks, Darcy. Good morning, everyone, and thanks for joining us for IGO's June quarter and the wrap-up of financial year 26. I'm joined this morning by Ian Rowe, newly appointed as our interim CFO. He'll be available to cover a few remarks on our finances, but also take some questions at the back end of our opening remarks. The interview was budgeted for some time and noted the business very well. Over the coming months he'll join me for some of our engagements with investors and analysts so you can get to know him better and have a chance to talk through some of the questions around the business. 30 June is always a good point to reflect back on in a central year and we finished with really strong momentum in safety and performance at Nova and a solid quarter at Greenwich's. all resulting in a strong balance sheet. We recognise there's still important challenges for us to work through at Kwinana and obviously a continued focus on Greenbushes as we work to drive towards the full potential of that amazing asset. Obviously the fire in the quarter at Greenbushes was another key event we had to work through. I'll cover more on that later. are ramping up soon. Beyond that, I want to also reflect on what we've achieved. We've really tightened up and simplified our business over the last 12 months. The key transaction we talked about post-quarter sets up Nova for a really good finish. Key message for today is IDEO is simpler, more capable and disciplined business than it was a year ago. We've got some very key areas of strength. and many more who will be using us for the future. On our results summary, there's five key takeaways I wanted to work through for today's results. Firstly, our safety performance has improved materially. That's supported by our visible leadership and strong discipline. Our group FIFR reduced to 3.7 and as of today, our business is over 200 days recordable injury free. The business has gone nearly a year without a significant potential incident. and for the astonishing achievement. I'm very proud of what the teams deliver. A strong focus since I started in this business on safety and I think the results today, as we close at FY26, are a ring of credit to them. It's no surprise that that safety performance correlates strongly with production performance and cost performance. And if we look at NOVA, it's an outstanding finish to the financial year, ahead of our lifetime production guidance and worldwide cost guidance. and as we approach end of life and end of mining, it only gets more complicated and I think that speaks to the performance and discipline of the operations team at Nova. We're also very pleased to announce the divestment to Global Lithium at the end of the quarter, which is after the end of the quarter. Together, our operating performance in this transaction are great examples of our approach and the track record we want to continue to build on. First, Greenbush has finished strongly with the production at the top end of our revised guidance. Excellent margin thanks to strongly realised pricing and the redimensionment of distributions from Winfield to TLEA. The fire at CG3 was disappointing and a real setback, particularly given the plant was wrapping up extremely well and in fact well ahead of our plans before the incident. I'll cover more on that in Greenbush's update further in the run back. Four, Kwinana production was impacted by a major plant shutdown. Lithium hydroxide production volumes reflect this. The refinery remains a challenge more broadly, addressing performance and finding a pathway to resolution. Kwinana is and continues to be a key priority for me in the business. Finally, the financial result underpinning all of this was very solid. Our underlying EBITDA was $180 million. taking into $286 million for the year, net cash increased 18% to $387 million, leaving us very well positioned for discipline, portfolio optimisation and growth. A couple more remarks on safety. I'm delighted with the improvement that we've seen over the last two years, and in particular in the last 12 months. As you know, this has been a strong area of focus for me. Thanks to the sustained efforts and our visible safety leadership, we've delivered a step change in performance and I would say we're now in the area of broad industry performance that everyone should be expecting from us. The TRIP were 3.7% down 24% in the quarter and 63% over the year. It's particularly pleasing given the number of challenges that the NOVA team had to work through as they pushed towards the end of life for the mine. also want to call out and credit our partners, our contract partners operating at the site, in particular Varmico, which has helped deliver this outstanding change and improvement in performance. Greenbushes and Kwinana safety and performance remain here as a focus. They are not operating at the same levels and we continue to work with our daily partners and businesses to strengthen their safety and controls, performance and leadership routines. At Nova, as I said, we delivered an outstanding operational result, finishing ahead of our lifetime production guidance and below cost guidance. The key point is that Nova continues to deliver reliable production, disciplined cost control, strong cash generation, late into its mine life, which is a very unique performance, something that we're very proud of, really reflects well on the team, their focus all the way to the end. Quarter-on-quarter production ease as expected following a planned April shutdown. Unit cash costs increasing 29% due to the low production profile and shutdown-related costs. Sales revenue increased 18% on the back of higher copper. Sales revenue is higher than the by-product pricing. EBITDA was lower quarter-on-quarter with the resulting impacted by an increase in our rehabilitation provisions and retention and redundancy provisions associated with our upcoming end of mine life. Naturally, we expect a number of these adjustments to our event to unwind as we close out the transaction with Global Lithium and we'll report on those in due course. The production results reflect an exceptional focus and discipline from the NOVA team and our contract partners and something that they should be very proud of what they've achieved as we move towards that final stage of mining closures. We're also very pleased to announce after the quarter that we agreed to divest NOVA to Global Lithium Resources once our mining operations are complete. This is a very positive outcome for AGO, Global Lithium, the local community, traditional owners and other stakeholders who have supported NOVA over the past decade. We continue to focus on our full closure planning right up to the finalisation of that agreement with Global Lithium. that include extensive stakeholder engagement covering our traditional owners and local community and government. Looking forward, we've upgraded our life of mine guidance through to the expected end of production late in the December quarter and guidance is now 19,000 to 20,000 tonnes of nickel production, cash costs of $4.25 per pound of nickel. Just to be clear, this is guidance for the life of mine across the FY26 and FY27 period. A simple deduction of the FY26 actuals gives you implied production of about 4,000 to 5,000 tonnes of production in the FY27 period. The green horses delivered a strong finish to FY26 with production at the top end of that revised guidance that we introduced last quarter. 80% EBITDA margins for the quarter. We saw an uptick in the mine grade last quarter as we moved back into the core of the ore body, which is positive and something I'd signposted. Recoveries and mill uptime meant that some of the benefits of that were not fully reflected in the production and we expect that to flow through and improve in this quarter and beyond. With the strategic options review continuing, Taliesin continues to progress those two extremes that we've talked through quarter on quarter. And I think a key area that I was pleased to see good progress was in the mine, taking the design, productivity, a number of changes to continue to work towards unlocking the full potential and productivity of green bushes. The June quarter showed some really positive trends in mining productivity. I've been down to the site three times over the last quarter. It was good to see that steady improvement. Mine production was also supported, as I said, by that move into the higher grade area, as we previously signposted. Production increased 10% to 387,000 tonnes, with CGP3 contributing approximately 71,000 tonnes. The plant was ramping up extremely well ahead of the fire in June. Most importantly, no one was hurt in that event and the plant is now expected to restart in the coming days. The investigation has been finalised and the team will naturally ensure that all of the learnings are embedded in their work going forward. Sponsoring sales increased 12% reflecting the late shipment from the prior quarter being accounted for in the June quarter. while the average realised flogging wind price increased to US$2,286 per tonne. The result reinforces the quality and cash generation potential of this world-class asset, particularly through periods strong at realised pricing. Winfield resumed distributions during this quarter with a dividend of AU$390 million declared on a 100% basis. The business also continues to build considerable cash receivables with these very favorable prices flowing through. At the same time, Greenwich still has meaningful improvement work ahead across safety, maintenance execution, plant performance, stability and recoveries and the broader mind and meal discipline that we expect to deliver significant uplifting performance. At the same time, The operation and improvement of life and mind optimisation also remains critical. While the team did obviously have some focus on the recovery of CGP3, which delayed some of that activity, they continue to progress that broader life and mind optimisation activity and we look forward to sharing more on that in the course. We continue to work closely with our partners through the joint venture CLEA and Taliesin to help them as they build out a more stable and consistently high performing operation. Looking into financial year 27, Greenbush's guidance that we've set has been laid out on the slide. Spodumene production between 1,500, sorry, 1,550,000 tonnes 1,750,000 tonnes of spodumene at an NC6 basis, cash costs between 380 and 440 Australian dollars per tonne, and our development and sustaining improvement capex, including inferred waste, ranged between 250 Australian and 3 Australian million dollars. Our guidance reflects that ongoing CGP3 ramp-up and improvement work is still required across the operation and as we see how C53 comes out of the restart, we can obviously refine our expectations. On the lithium downstream, we foreshadowed last quarter the production has been impacted by a major plant shutdown designed to improve plant performance. The lithium hydroxide production was 897 tonnes per quarter. The lower production volumes reflected in significantly higher conversion costs for the quarter, as you would have expected. Sales volumes were also lower in line production. The average realised price has improved considerably to $19,543 US per tonne. Production costs were also elevated with the refinery offline for a good part of the quarter, even at a loss of $88 million on a 100% basis. including the negative imagery adjustment of about $37 million. Further shutdown is underway through July and August, which will reduce our September quarter production. FY27 guidance for Guadana is set at lithium hydroxide production of 9,000 to 11,000 tonnes, conversion costs ranging from $16,000 to $18,000 per tonne. and Sustained Improvement Capital of $75 to $90 million. With that, I'll hand over to Ian to talk through some highlights from their financials and then pick up other key ones.

Yeah, thanks, Ivan. It's good to be speaking with you all this morning. I look forward to meeting you here at Massey. Look, we play as FY26 with real financial momentum. Nova finished the year strongly and is looking in price to recover the 80s power agreement which we've gained very clearly. For the core group, sales revenue rose 18% to $141 million, driven by high profit sales, liabilities and buyer prices at Nova. Our share of net profit from TLEA increased 38% to $121 million, reflecting the strongly realised swaddle in price and an 18% EBITDA margin at Greenbushes. Importantly, when the museum did get into institutions during the quarter, a clear marker of the assets cash generating strength as pricing has recovered. Group underlying needs are $118 million for the quarter and $286 million for the full year. That includes around $31 million of year-end adjustments at NOVA relating to both an increase in the year-end rehabilitation provision and the retention and redundancy accruals tied to the end of mine life. The rehab component will transfer on completion of the NOVA divestment, so it is largely time and money. Adjusting to those, the underlying result is in line with our expectations. The one standout area that I'd really like to pull out is our cash performance. Underlying free cash flow nearly doubled to $70 million during the quarter and net cash increased to $387 million. For the full year, we generated $134 million of underlying free cash flow. This capital discipline and cash flow is deliberate. On the one hand, it reinforces what a wonderful asset November has been, generating strong cash flow right to the end. On the other, it reflects the balance sheet flexibility that we are being intentional about as we prepare for life beyond October. Naturally, we'll have more to say on capital management with our four-year results in six months, but this decision will hold us in good stead as we look to grow the business. With that, I'll hand back to Ivan to set through our growth priorities in more detail.

Thanks, Ian. Yeah, a couple of final remarks and then we can open up for some Q&A. Our growth agenda builds on that strong base that I've talked about, a simpler, tighter business focus on copper and lithium. We are pursuing growth through three routes, exploration, which is, I guess, a real category in IGO, biopsy, which I've provided a little bit more detail in our quarterly, and discipline M&A. On exploration, we cleaned up our portfolio, reset our focus on where we're operating our tenement package, and ultimately bring a focus on high quality copper and lithium opportunities. The FY27 exploration budget is 35 to 40 million Australian dollars. BioHeat is another growth pathway. This is technology, sulphide leached technology developed more than 25 years ago, prevents a very timely opportunity to address some of the structural challenges in the global copper industry. and we've recently redirected some focus on this technology. It was originally created with a focus on nickel and it clearly works across a number of different base metals and you can see it presenting in sulphides. And so as we work through proving that out, demonstrating understanding its economic potential, we'll provide more updates. But we believe it's an important area to focus on are looking to unlock low-grade sulphide deposits where the technology might offer a different pathway to venue. Very early days, there's plenty of technical and commercial work underway, and there'll be some very clear milestones before any material capital commitment. Non-M&A remains, of course, one potential route for growth in critical minerals aligned to that strategy, but we remain highly selective and disciplined. will only pursue opportunities where the strategic fit, distinctive IGO advantage, where we bring river values to the table, and as you'd expect, disciplined capital allocation. Nothing's changed in this space since I joined the business two and a half years ago. So in summary, FY26 finished strongly and leaves IGO positioned well, stronger, simpler, and in better shape looking forward to the future. Our safety performance, continue to improve through the year and of course correlates and mirrors very well with the kind of production and operating performance that we've demonstrated at Nova. It's delivered ahead of production guidance and below cost guidance for the period where the challenge was only greater as we moved into the final stages of mining for the ore body and we announced the investment to Global Lithium obviously with No care and maintenance, no overlap, no increased costs carried as we look forward. Green Bunches has delivered a stronger final quarter supported by the CTV3 ramp up, strong pricing and an 80% even done margin. Plenty more to do as we've talked about, but it's nice to see a better quarter and some real improvements starting to flow through the operations. and IGO, as Ian called out, has ended the year with net cash $387 million. So plenty of work to continue doing. We've got a very focused business, continuing to look through those few talents that are remaining in our list and then looking for the best pathways and opportunities for growth. With that, I'll turn it over to some Q&A.

Thank you. If you would like to ask a question via the phone, you need to press the star key followed by the number 1 on your telephone keypad. If you would like to cancel your request, please press star 2. Management kindly asks that you please limit your questions to one per person and then rejoin the queue for any follow-up questions. Your first question today comes from Hugo Nicolaki from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Good morning, Ivan and Ian. Thanks for the update this morning. The first one for me is on the timing of cash flows between the lithium JVs. You've noted The cash that came out of Winfield in the quarter also highlighting that CGP3 is restarting. Your 27 cap exit Greenbushes is lower and Kwinana year on year your guidance is pretty similar. Is there any reason we should be aware of that the cash sweep mechanism from TLA up to IGO shouldn't see that cash come through ahead of August?

Hugo, yeah, it was great to see Obviously, with the market recovery, the cash is starting to really build up rapidly in Palace and in Winfield for that to start flowing through to shareholders. And that's obviously very recent. Nice to see some cash flowing into TLEA. We'll obviously then take some decisions at the TLEA level. The board will consider that as we start to look forward and see how the market behaves. So, yeah, there's nothing beyond that that I can comment on and there's nothing and more substantial or other publications that you should consider. It's obviously a function of that market recovery that we've all been pleased to see and now starting to see that cash flow through.

Got it. I'll wait for August then on that timing. And then just maybe one for Ian, just sort of picking through the Winfield cash flow a little bit more. You made the comment around the receivables billed. If we look at the cash balance you've reported the last couple of quarters, it does imply that there's a significant working capital piece or maybe it's tax in terms of that cash flow piece. You ought to just elaborate a bit more on what those moving pieces are and if we should see that working capital headwind unwind in the coming quarters and support prices being equal, a bigger step up in cash flow coming out of the wind field, JV?

Yeah, as Ivan said, Hugo, we can't give you too many specifics other than the working capital position is really strong. Trade receivables have gone up significantly at the Winfield level, so we do expect that cash to subvert over the next quarter.

Thanks, Alastair McDonald.

Thank you. Your next question comes from Mitch Ryan from Jefferies. Please go ahead.

Thank you Ivan and Ian. My question is just how should we be thinking about the ramp up profile of CGP from here following the fire and maybe from a more granular perspective what volumes are in the guidance for FY27 from CGP3?

Thanks Mitch. We obviously will, we hope that it will ramp up Thank you very much. to get to 100% by the end of the calendar year. So no change to that. There's nothing there that says we should be surprised, but I'm obviously not able to comment until we actually see it start up and how it behaves. One of the things I know the team was very focused on was getting the recovery completed as quickly as possible, not just because we want the production, but because the longer the plant stands idle, the more potential for issues to emerge. And so in seven weeks, they've obviously kept a close focus on the assets, made sure everything's healthy and ready, doing final checks at the moment. So I guess we'll get back to it and hopefully start seeing some very strong production from August onwards.

Are you able to provide any of the metrics around what you were seeing before the fire, either volume, recoveries, throughput?

Yeah, well, I'm not going to give you specific numbers, but I can tell you, as I said, when I say we're well ahead of the ramp-up curve, and I think in the last quarter I said, you know, when we're in that final part of ramp-up, which always takes a bit longer, but basically we had seen that plant demonstrate and potential recoveries through port, et cetera, very effectively. So we're extremely pleased that it could come online.

Yeah, thank you for taking my question today.

Thanks, mate. Thank you. Your next question comes from Austin Yung from Macquarie. Please go ahead.

Good morning, Ivan and the team. Just a question on the production profile. for financial year 27. Should we anticipate lower volume in the next quarter given that you're going to restart CGP3? And also, how are you progressing with the high-grade mining area? Any kind of will be very helpful. Just, you know, the reason why I'm asking just because I think the market is going to be fairly tight in August and September. So, can you see if the operation has any plan to take advantage of rebounding leaking prices? Thank you.

Thanks, Austin. Thanks for the market forecast too. It's great to hear. Certainly, we look forward to that. The start of the mine, as I said, I've been down there three times in the quarter. I'm getting down there quite frequently and I'm really pleased with the progress there. They are back into the high-grade core of the mine. They are being disciplined in how they provide feed to the ROM pads and the blending. We're seeing that obviously flow through and improve The performance in the plants, there's still work going on with recoveries. I'm sure there'll be a question coming, I guess, without getting into too many specifics. It was great to see post-border, I was down there, some real improvement in CGP1 where they'd had some challenges that they'd got on top of and were back on foot on recoveries. but getting back to your point on the high-grade portal, if they're there now, that pushback's complete and they're in a good place looking forward. In terms of production performance, I mean, the team, they'll produce everything they can and continue to drive that asset to its full potential. Our guidance indicates, based on the plans that we have from Taliesin, what we expect to be in an appropriate range. And as we see more from that improvement program, we can obviously then tighten or revise that as needed. But at this point, that's, I guess, what we think makes sense for reference point seven.

Thank you. We'll pass it on.

Thank you. Your next question comes from Daniel Morgan from Baron Joey.

Please go ahead. Hi, Ivan. I'm just looking to expand on the shuts and rectifications that I guess the team is planning at Greenbush. The other concentrators, non-CGP3, just what is the timing and what would success look like from those? Thank you.

Dan, can you just clarify? Are you talking about just improvements in general or what? When you say shutdowns, I mean they're on a normal shutdown cycle. There's nothing new or special coming up in the plan beyond the normal cycle. I think maybe you can clarify your question.

Yeah, sorry. I think in the release you were referring to taking a lot of the learnings from CGP3 and then applying them to the other concentrators. I mean obviously CGP3 has ramped up well.

Yeah, sorry, Dan, that makes sense. Yeah, look, I was really referring to the cause of the fire. As that investigation is completed, there will be a suite of learnings and they're hard ones. It's really difficult to see that kind of impact on our asset. But ultimately, there'll be a set of learnings that we want to make sure are rolled right back through the entire site, obviously in particular the other farms.

And just on the dividend decision made at the Winfield level, can you provide any insight into what was factoring into the magnitude of that dividend and what the right, like should we take this as a proportion of free cash flow as sort of a go forward right from Winfield or what other considerations were made in the Winfield dividend decision? Thank you.

OK, there's a very structured capital framework that we apply at Winfield. The board received a recommendation from Taliesin based on their debt. I won't go through the list. You guys know the kind of pieces we take into account and that recommendation was accepted by the board. We'll obviously continue to see those quarter on quarter. You know, with the kind of price environment, we expect to see very strong cash generation and flow from... from the asset. So that, you know, was basically the first big check that we built a cut for a while. It was great to see that. As Ian Simon posted, we've seen obviously significant build-in receivables working out the position, which is no surprise, just as the price rolls through. And, of course, that is the point where that just turns into cash and starts to float order on order. and I'm pre-empting the other question you might be contemplating if someone else is and that's around debt at Winfield and that's something that the board will always consider and look at to optimise. At this point we feel pretty comfortable with the level but that's something we'll consider as things progress and we see how the market evolves.

Okay, thank you Ivan for your perspectives. Thanks Dan.

Thank you. Once again, if you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. Your next question comes from Ben Lyons from Jardin Securities Limited. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Jay, Ivan. I'd just like to press a little bit further on Hugo's initial question, please. just noting that about 200 million bucks is going to drop in the TLEA tin this time around. I'm just really interested in what the IGO position is as you head into that TLEA board meeting. You've essentially flagged flat capex guidance at Kwinana and so clearly we're not facing into a massive capital intensive rebuild of the refinery and those operating guidance metrics that you've provided also imply reduced cash burn at Kwinana as well. So I would have thought there's a very high probability that TLEA distributes to the IGO bank account this time around. Just interested in your perspectives as you head into that meeting. Thank you.

Yeah, thanks, Ben. They're all valid observations as you look through the accounts and the performance. And then we'll take that through and some recent close consideration with the board. I can't at this point signpost our dividend position from TLEA. I've got to step through and consider. The one piece that you probably didn't mention, which we've always got a common play, is what the forward market looks like as well and our confidence in that. There's a lot of volatility in lithium. We've seen probably even more so in the equities and the actual underlying market. plenty to take into account and that at that next board meeting no doubt that'll be a topic of discussion.

Well thank you and maybe just flipping back to the Taliesin level, still waiting for an unwind of the concentrate inventories from green bushes and sort of keep pushing it out quarter on quarter. This question gets asked every quarter, I guess. Is there any reason why there's a surplus of concentrate being held at site or at the port? Is there ongoing port congestion or should we just eventually expect those concentrate inventories to unwind? Thanks, mate.

Yeah, I think it's more just the flow of production. The port does present challenges for the team time and time again. It is congested. There are challenges there and they continue to work to optimise that. As we ramp up production further, not just for CGV3, the other productivity initiatives, that's only going to get harder. So there is a stream of work focused on that as part of the broader SOR. There's no intention to hold inventory, of course. You know, every tonne we can get out of the ship, we see to it. Given the overall FY26 performance was below Thank you. Your next question comes from Levi Spry from UBS. Please go ahead.

G'day, Ivan. Just wondering about some of the longer-term plans. There's green bushes, including... Are you sort of planning on releasing the optimised long plan in September?

Did you just break up a little bit there, Levi, talking about sort of the life of mine optimization SOR work?

Yeah, just wondering if you're still planning on releasing some of the... The longer term metrics and some of the optimised life plan as per earlier guided to in September.

Yeah, we continue to be eager to do that. I want to be in a position and I think ideally have Rob obviously as the CEO of Alastair standing up and sharing more about business. I think that's something that's going to be welcomed and valued by our investors and analysts. The work's continuing. As I said, they did make very good progress on the mine in the quarter. Some of the other work did slow a bit during the fire and other issues they're working through. But as soon as we've got something finalised through the board in a position packaged up, we'll be looking to find a way to get that out to the market. I know how valuable that will be so you can get a longer-term view of what's coming in the asset. So, yeah, no... I guess to be really clear, there's no pullback, shying away. That's a critical strain of work. It's got significant resource and focus on it. And I think it's very important for us to finalise and get out to you so that you can build out a fuller view of the potential of green bushes.

Thanks, Alan.

Thank you. Your next question is a follow-up from Hugo Nicolaki from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Thanks for taking the follow-up. Just firstly, Greenbush's capex into FY27, obviously they've stepped down. I appreciate things like water and tailings are going to be lumpy, but can you maybe step us through a little bit more what is in that guidance for FY27 and should we expect to step up in that tailings and water work then in FY28?

Yeah, Hugo, I can't give you a detailed breakdown, but look, a lot of it is just, you know, the normal run-of-mill sustaining and improvement capex tailings continuing. I was walking out on TSF 4 two weeks ago when I was down there. That work will continue through this quarter. As an example, there's some work on some of the water dams as well for storage. I think one of the key things though that we'll and will profile will move period to period but as you signpost with the significant update to the licensed mine ORE MRE in January 7 this year the steepening of the pit wall the reducing of strip of course is going to start to float through and you if you look under the covers in the FY27 Here you see a big set in the deferred waste. Now, ultimately, what I'm focused on is seeing that mine productivity coming. I want to see them getting the very best out of the assets, top performance, very, very strong control around drill and blast, geotech disciplines, etc. And, you know, where that's accounted for between OpEx and CapEx, I'm probably a little less focused. What we want to see is great outputs and performance. But with that strip coming off, you can imagine that our deferred waste allocation is coming off significantly. You're starting to see that play through. And then, you know, you stand back and start looking at the all-in sustaining costs of green bushes. It's phenomenal. It really is. And this is where the strength of this asset shines out in comparison to all of its fears in the hard rock world. It's just nowhere close. And I think it's only going to get better with the improvements, productivity uplift that's coming. and it continues to push green bushes. Yes, they've had some setbacks. Yes, as I've said, you know, it was a tough quarter last quarter to deliver a downgrade on guidance. But, you know, this is the source of improvement and performance. There is no back off on that. And as they deliver that, I think it continues to position green bushes as one of the most competitive sources of nuclear units in the world, regardless of the nature of production, be it bronze, red or otherwise.

Thanks for that Ivan and just maybe one on the sale of Nova and just sort of working through that one for my benefit a little bit. Look I appreciate obviously a lot of provisions there. I think you know your December half year you had about $120 million of provisions on the balance sheet. You've added a little bit to that today but selling it for $7 million so call it sort of 130 mil of sort of enterprise value there. It seems like a lot of infrastructure that the replacement value of a number of just those components would be considerably higher than that. I appreciate it's only worth what someone's prepared to pay for it, but it seems like a relatively low value to realise. Do you want to just comment on maybe some of the other liabilities there or sort of why sell it for what I perceive to be a relatively low value versus the installed asset base?

Let me throw that one to Ian. He actually ran that transaction, which is great. He did that in his spare time. And he can talk you through that random logic. There you go. It's a great question.

Yeah, thanks, Hugo. Obviously, you called out the headline consideration, which is $7 million for us. It's a share transaction, so we're selling it over in fee, including all the rehabilitation obligations that go with that. I think we've known accordingly that the The balance between this and over 30 juniors is roughly $70 million. For us, we obviously explored a number of opportunities, options for that asset, including moving the plant, which she pointed to. And frankly, this is the best overall value on this ride to go by the time your customers dismantle the plant and move it elsewhere. It's a great outcome for our people and the fact that we'll be able to complete that transaction as soon as possible after the completion of mining operations means that we can reduce the ongoing cost base there and focus on growth.

I'd just add a couple of additional points. I mean, part of it is also ensuring we've got a very credible counterparty to take on those obligations, and that's something we looked at carefully. And Global Lithium will get full value from the assets. To your point, they're only 10 years old. They're fantastic assets, and I'm sure all that will serve them very well. But that closure, liability and refinement, that future work, we want to ensure that that's dealt with professionally We did a lot of work on the closure planning, and so that's an important part of the decision. I think the other factor to take into account, Hugo, is the location of NOVA. It is very remote from a lot of other mine CWA resources, which makes it more challenging. If you had transplanted that into the middle of the Goldfields or in Pilbara, then yeah, sure, it could be a very different story. But given where it was, I think this is an outstanding outcome for IGO. we've avoided any caramel maintenance, any holding costs individually, wrap up production, take the concentrate and then finalise the transaction within days. So it's about as optimised as I think we could ever expect. I was really pleased what Ian and the team achieved there. Some of you are proud of.

Yep, got it. That's clear. Obviously the remoteness making a big impact there. And then lastly, if I can here, just give a sense of the timeline where we should maybe start to see some of the drilling and exploration pieces come through at Cosmos and some of these other assets over the rest of FY27?

Sure, yeah, great question. There's drilling happening right now at Cosmos, which is good. So they've been in there for a couple of weeks. Assays are due in soon, which will be interesting. There's some drilling up in the Kimberleys, which will start with spires and heritage clearances. And there's a number of projects internationally that we're working through. I'd expect those to all start to see exploration span in the ground through FY27. As I said, a predominant focus on OHA for that work and quite a big shift in approach for exploration. We have a deep capability in our organisation. I mean, absolutely outstanding technical capability, but we have really reset the whole strategy and approach and we are pursuing areas where there is basically null and minimalisation of very very high prospectivity as I said strong focus on copper and you know of course in jurisdictions where we expect that we can turn that into a mine this isn't about just trying to find a resource and then you know figure it out later so we're thinking through these projects from start to finish before we start committing any capital towards them and as we get further into that program I'll definitely report more and and maybe get John and Phil Rowe out of exploration and come in and provide a deeper dive on it. It'd be nice to not just talk about Cologne and as much as I love Greenville since I've seen the improvements, but it'd be good to pick up another key thread as part of our business and our growth. Got it.

So this is a high level then. Should we expect exploration to step up in FY27 versus the, I think, $33 million spent in FY26?

No, look, our guidance remains 35 to 40. We think that's an appropriate amount of allocation from our balance sheet. Naturally, we will continue to try and turn the payment over and draw value from it. So, in other words, you know, we're not saying we should draw that much off the balance sheet, but that's the envelope that we've allocated. We think that's appropriate for our business, for the targets, the direction we're taking. Naturally, if we do hit significant mineralisation, then we might take the decision to... to allocate more. That's something we go through with the board carefully. But at this point, yeah, just roll forward that 35 or 40. I think that's the right end of the line.

Cool. Thanks, guys. Appreciate the follow-ups.

Thanks, Hugo. Thank you.

Your next question comes from Andrew Harrington from Petra Capital. Please go ahead.

My questions were all around the exploration work and the spend, so you've answered most of those. Perhaps you can add more colour into the projects or locations that you can be focusing other than Cosmos?

Yeah, I'd love to. I won't yet because we're not quite there to announce all those things. They are exciting and if you start to think about major copper belts, and the rest of the international teams. The one that we have announced so far is Force Copper Wolf in Arizona, and we expect drilling to start later this year on that. We have a number of very interesting targets there that the teams work through. We completed a transaction recently to take 100% of that tenement package, and I really look forward to seeing the results there.

And will anything be spent on lithium exploration?

Yeah. Okay. Possibly. I mean, we've continued to work through some clearances and some targets in the Cosmos tenement package and also Forestania. There are clear indications of tegna sites in this area and in the Cosmos, you've got Kathleen Valley, which is an amazing body just to the north of it. But we're just getting through the process to get clearances and then prioritise our drilling accordingly as we go. There's also some tenements in the military, which have also had some focus, and the team's continuing to work through their data and look to see if there's any further targets they want to put drilling into through FY27. So, look, we've used far off the agenda. It's just, you know, continue to be very searching for where we place the money next race.

Cheers. Thank you.

Thank you. Your next question is a follow-up from Austin Yang from Macquarie. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Ivan. Just a quick one on the downstream. So in the last 12 months, we can all see the value is accruing at the upstream. I need to understand, you know, given you have additional work planned for Kwinana, have there been any progress on, you know, how to approach this project, you know, given your discussion and meeting with your JV partners? Thank you.

Yeah, you're a little bit quiet there, Austin. I think talking to projects, the shutdown that we saw in the June quarter and then we're continuing now was focused on three areas. Normal shutdown maintenance, routine maintenance. Secondly, improvements to lift the nameplate or lift the performance or approach to nameplate in the assets. and the third which we mentioned in the quarterly was the gas treatment facility which is an important requirement to make sure that we meet all of the environmental conditions and the operations of the future. So that work will basically close out with this current shutdown and then we'll see how the assets are performing. The team at TLEA at Kwinana are naturally dedicated very heavily to deliver the best production performance that they can and are doing a great job stepping through those projects. Ultimately, that unfortunately doesn't change the challenge economics for lithium refining in Australia. That's not a function of Guarana. It's something that we all have to recognise. It's obviously been compounded recently with the increase in sulfuric prices, other input costs. but ultimately that's a broader piece of work for us to solve.

Yes, just on that point, I was trying to understand any progress in terms of how you approach this project at the joint venture level has happened. Would you share it or any opportunity to hand it over? Have any of those been explored? Thanks.

Austin, we continue to work through those questions and concerns with TLC and nothing's changed from an IGO point of view. Our position remains consistent. We're just working through that respectfully with TLC to see what pathway can be achieved and we'll update you further once that works completely.

Thank you, Pastor.

Thanks, Austin. Thank you. Your next question comes from Lyndon Fagan from JP Morgan. Please go ahead.

Good morning, Ivan. First question I had was just on Greenbush's grades. Why weren't they up more in the quarter? I thought we were expected to get a bit more of a recovery. And then the second one I had was just in terms of the tailings retreatment plan. In which year does it actually run out of tailings to treat and need to I guess have an investment to take all.

Okay thanks Lyndon. On grades first of all we're back into that high grade four and what we're seeing is I think discipline mining, discipline management are the wrong feed for each of the plants and so we're now targeting the right grade for the right plant. You see a higher grade into CGP1, that's how it's designed and still by industry standards, the very high gradients are two and three, but quite a step down. And what we want to do is manage that seed and control that in a very disciplined manner. As you know, the reserve grade for the life of mining is something we need to be conscious of. And if we were to just continue to mine above that consistently, you can imagine that you create a shortfall later. by starting to get this discipline and control into the mining sequence and the way that we create those wrong feed stockpiles allows us to balance and smooth out that performance through the operation. And, you know, we're not looking to just throw the best high-grade material at these plants just to try and hit a quarterly number, for example. So ultimately, I'm really pleased we're back in that high-grade environment We're managing it in a disciplined manner and you should continue to see that run through the production results looking forward. On tailings treatment facility, you probably can imagine that the grade has dropped off through FY25 and FY26 was really significant in the early days, I think above 1.4% lithium and it's down lower than that now. The team is still producing well from that asset and they continue to study and assess the potential resource and how far we can extend that with the old tailings facilities at Greenbushes. At this stage, I think that would take us well into 28th, but until that work is finished, I can't give you a definitive answer. and in parallel we'll study which is then continuing to say what kind of crushing grinding capacity would you put in front of that facility to continue to leverage the flotation circuits and the production volume capacity that's there. Again, once that works further progressed I can give you an update but I think the takeaway is we're not expecting any dial back of those times. I mean it's a great facility. maybe not as substantial as Chem 1, 2 and 3 but still offers considerable production, valuable production capacity at the site and that will take us well through the back end of this decade.

Thanks and just a quick follow up if I may on the capex. So it seems like FY27 at Greenbushes is more or less just a stay in business type number. Do we read into that that there's a A lack of desire from all of the partners at this stage to spend on growth. I mean, I realise you haven't come out yet with the life and mind optimisation study, but I mean, there doesn't appear to be anything in there for early works or, yeah, I mean, is that the right interpretation? Yeah, I don't understand it.

It's a great question and you commented on it, SOR, that like the mine optimisation. That is a place where we stand back and look at the big picture and say what's the right sweet spot for production volumes and therefore the capital allocation across the site. There's no question that more times equals more money. I mean, we know that volume equals value in one sense. but you know doing this in a really thoughtful planned and disciplined manner with the long-term plan I think is what we should expect from Greenbush is from the owners of that asset and I'm really pleased that the board's obviously working through that in that with that mindset. You know clearly there is potential for more production growth. We've all talked about chem grade before and it sits out there. That asset, the broader mine, has got enormous potential. But I think showing that we've got existing assets running extremely well, meaningful potential, running above main plate, really delivering on costs and structured and disciplined maintenance, very high recoveries, all of these foundations, I think, then earn the right to grow rather than just saying, well, because the market needs more, it's a good plan and just throw the capital at it. and Rob's taking, I think, a very thoughtful approach to those improvements and then broader SOR will be in a position to say where does that next major set of growth fit.

So just to pick up on that, you reckon it hasn't earned the right to grow at this stage?

Yeah, I don't think we've reached full potential. So obviously this financial year, or FY26, was a tough year for Greenbush as it finished well in the last quarter but it had some difficult periods and there's still plenty of improvement going on and I think the ability to translate that capability back into a new asset means that we're going to squeeze every last strip of return from new capital that will be allocated across the business. Whether that's for a 10-grade plant or new assets in the mine, It doesn't really matter. I think that's good discipline in any mining operation.

Great. Thanks for all of that, Ivan.

Thanks, Leonard.

Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. I'll now hand the conference back to Mr Vella for any closing remarks.

Thank you, Darcy. Thanks for the questions. We covered lots of ground there and we're right on time. So just as a quick wrap up, A very strong finish to FY26, leaving IDO in a great position as we look forward to the next stage of this business. A transformational lift in safety and performance and a strong correlation obviously with the operating production disciplines and the performance and outcomes at Nova. The transaction with Global Lithium I think positions us extremely well and simplifies our portfolio further. Greenbush's strong quarter and a good finish to the financial year. 80% EBITDA margins and a imminent restart of the CTV3 sets us up for a great start to this financial year. IDEO ended the year with net cash of $387 million. Strong balance sheet, strong cash position. All in all, it still works through and some key issues that we're working through, a lot of that's been covered well on the call. thanks for everyone's time and attention we look forward to updating you further after our year end results are announced in August bye for now